JEA hunt for headquarters site is silent on evacuation risk

[Steve]

Anyone know how many office workers does Fanatics have in Jacksonville?  Surely they wouldn't move warehouse and manufacturing activities to Lot J.

Office side, put it this way - I'd guess they fill about 150k SqFt of office space, give or take. Their call center in particular is very seasonal, so the space is largely unused 8 months out of the year.

On the warehouse no - they aren't moving that downtown. They use about 750k SqFt of warehouse space between two facilities.

That aside, there would likely need to be some incentives either from COJ or from the developers for them to move. They just moved to their southside campus in 2015.

*Disclaimer - I worked at Fanatics until late 2015, but everything I've shared can be found publicly on the internet.

[Kerry]

Surely we aren't going to pay substantial subsidies for a company to move across town.

[thelakelander]

^We do it all the time. All it takes is a company suggesting they're open to leaving town and another municipality offering incentives to get them too.

[Steve]

Surely we aren't going to pay substantial subsidies for a company to move across town.

We literally did that with EverBank. Not terribly uncommon for larger employers.

[Kerry]

10X the subsidy we paid Everbank still doesn't equal half what Khan is asking for.  No one in Jax is going to go for that.  Curry would find himself on a recall petition.

[Steve]

10X the subsidy we paid Everbank still doesn't equal half what Khan is asking for.  No one in Jax is going to go for that.  Curry would find himself on a recall petition.

What is Khan asking for?

[Bill Hoff]

Flex N Gate? Fanatics? Firehouse Subs? No, no and no.

The *perfect* fit as a local anchor for Lot J office development is so obvious I'm shocked others haven't suggested it yet . . . .

ONE SPARK.

It makes too much sense. Let's make it happen.

[Kerry]

10X the subsidy we paid Everbank still doesn't equal half what Khan is asking for.  No one in Jax is going to go for that.  Curry would find himself on a recall petition.

What is Khan asking for?

If JEA had selected Lot J it would have been $60,000,000.

[DrQue]

LOL

[Steve]

10X the subsidy we paid Everbank still doesn't equal half what Khan is asking for.  No one in Jax is going to go for that.  Curry would find himself on a recall petition.

What is Khan asking for?

If JEA had selected Lot J it would have been $60,000,000.

Umm....no. If JEA had selected Lot J I'll give you the Parking Garage, as that seemed like a mess waiting to happen that the taxpayers would have had to have eaten. While expensive, it wouldn't have been $60M.

But under your logic, the city is subsidizing the Ryan Companies $72 million. Not sure that holds water.

[thelakelander]

The Lot J garage is estimated to cost $40 to $45 million. Taxpayers will be on the hook for it. That was mentioned at the meeting.

[Steve]

The Lot J garage is estimated to cost $40 to $45 million. Taxpayers will be on the hook for it. That was mentioned at the meeting.

No argument on the garage. But can someone explain how a garage costs THAT much? Is it the site cleanup or something?

The Ryan proposal won and is expected to cost $72M. There's a garage component in that. Are we really to believe that the garage is more than half of the $72M?

[Westside Guy]

The Lot J garage is estimated to cost $40 to $45 million. Taxpayers will be on the hook for it. That was mentioned at the meeting.

No argument on the garage. But can someone explain how a garage costs THAT much? Is it the site cleanup or something?

The Ryan proposal won and is expected to cost $72M. There's a garage component in that. Are we really to believe that the garage is more than half of the $72M?

If I remember correctly they want to build the parking garage where the retention pond currently sits on Georgia Street. That would be a lot of infill and costs before they even start construction. Another added cost I heard them say in the JEA meeting is that they would have to move one of the cables that holds up the radio tower.

[thelakelander]

I'm not sure how they came up with the number but it will be built over that pond and will have 3,000 spaces. The garage will have enough spaces for the rest of Lot J as well. They just would have provided 850 of those spaces to JEA.

[vicupstate]

A 3,000 space garage, even without rentention pond issues, would cost at least $60mm would it not? 

I have never heard of a single garage being that big. It would seem the entry/exit queues would be enormous, but I am not well versed in such things.

Considering the two garages that are already in the Sports district, 3,000 seems like a lot more than necessary.